Posted on 01/29/2004 9:04:51 AM PST by Dog
Spirit Sends First Photo Since Troubles Began
By Robert Roy Britt Senior Science Writer, SPACE.com
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NASA (news - web sites)'s troubled rover Spirit has sent a new photograph back from Mars. It is the robot's first significant data transmission since its computer went haywire last week.
The image was taken and sent back Wednesday. It was captured by the rover's front hazard avoidance camera and shows the robotic arm extended to a rock previously named Adirondack. Mission managers did not say whether it was an indicator of Spirit's health.
Spirit's science operations halted just as it crawled to the pointy rock and was about to begin drilling into it. The rover's computer rebooted itself more than 100 times over a two-day period and, at first, sent back beeps but no data. Engineers have since determined that the problem appears to involve too many files overloading the onboard computer memory.
A spectrometer, which would identify minerals in the rock, is still placed on Adirondack, as it had been instructed prior to the computer glitch.
"Engineers are working to restore Spirit to working order so that the rover can resume the scientific exploration of its landing area," a NASA statement accompanying the picture said. No other details have been provided about the rover's condition since a Wednesday morning press briefing.
"Right now we're working to get complete control of the vehicle, and we're still not quite there," Jennifer Trosper, Mission Manager for the Mars Exploration Rover program at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said earlier Wednesday. "If we're on the right track, we hope to be back doing some science by early next week. If we're not on the right track, it could take longer than that."
Spirit is in the Gusev Crater on Mars. Its twin, Opportunity, is on the other side of the planet and preparing to roll off its landing pad, possibly as early as Sunday.
The combined mission cost is $820 million and is designed to determine whether Mars was once wetter, possibly with the conditions necessary for life.
From what I'm hearing, the problem is not the OS, which is doing exactly what it's supposed to do.
The problem is the engineers that set it up. Apparently when the flash device was formated, it was formated with the expectation of only holding a certain number of files. When they exceeded that number, the file handler in the OS refused to access any more files. IOW, it operated as designed.
The fix that they are setting up for this weekend is basically a format and reinstall. Once the filesystem is set up properly, the rover shouldn't have this kind of problem again.
A lot of Unix engineers are familiar with this kind of problem. Anyone who has set up a system that grew much faster than expected has probably run into the same issue.
Well, that depends. If you are looking at if from Microsoft's point of view:
A. Java runs on platforms other than Windows.
B. Java isn't owned and controlled by Microsoft.
C. Java doesn't let Microsoft force upgrades.
D. Java doesn't let Microsoft charge license fees.
E. Java can't be dropped at Microsoft's whim.
Looking at it from that perspective, then yes, C# fixes all of those problems.
You have a way with words...
With a little effort, you could get a pretty fair Haiku out of that:
Spirit finds its sense,
Sends a picture home
From the place it lost its mind.
If you go with it and get any takers, kindly provide a link here as well, Earthling.
-archy-/-
Doesn't all software do what it's supposed to do (ie. programmed to do), as long as the hardware is working properly? :)
Thanks for the additional information. I'm an embedded flight software engineer at NASA Goddard. In my early years there (roughly ten years ago), I helped develop Command & Data Handling flight software on 386/VRTX missions but later on (about five years ago) I worked on RAD6000/VxWorks missions. I'm currently working on component level (microcontroller) hardware that will still fly in space but the software will not require an RTOS. The information I've received concerning Spirit's troubles was of a superficial nature and I appreciate your filling in the details.
Save it for Monday, gaining a wider audience, and also offering a choice of reflecting on the renewed Martian efforts, or the results of Sunday's Superbowl contest. The dichotomy ought to offer interesting results.
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